Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci , more commonly Leonardo da Vinci or simply Leonardo, was an Italian Renaissance polymath whose areas of interest included invention, painting, sculpting, architecture, science, music, mathematics, engineering, literature, anatomy, geology, astronomy, botany, writing, history, and cartography. He has been variously called the father of palaeontology, ichnology, and architecture, and is widely considered one of the greatest painters of all time. Sometimes credited with the inventions of the parachute, helicopter and tank, he epitomised the Renaissance humanist ideal.
Many historians and scholars regard Leonardo as the prime exemplar of the "Universal Genius" or "Renaissance Man", an individual of "unquenchable curiosity" and "feverishly inventive imagination". According to art historian Helen Gardner, the scope and depth of his interests were without precedent in recorded history, and "his mind and personality seem to us superhuman, while the man himself mysterious and remote". Marco Rosci notes that while there is much speculation regarding his life and personality, his view of the world was logical rather than mysterious, and that the empirical methods he employed were unorthodox for his time.
Born out of wedlock to a notary, Piero da Vinci, and a peasant woman, Caterina, in Vinci in the region of Florence, Leonardo was educated in the studio of the renowned Florentine painter Andrea del Verrocchio. Much of his earlier working life was spent in the service of Ludovico il Moro in Milan. He later worked in Rome, Bologna and Venice, and he spent his last years in France at the home awarded to him by Francis I of France.
Leonardo was, and is, renowned primarily as a painter. Among his works, the Mona Lisa is the most famous and most parodied portrait and The Last Supper the most reproduced religious painting of all time. Leonardo's drawing of the Vitruvian Man is also regarded as a cultural icon, being reproduced on items as varied as the euro coin, textbooks, and T-shirts. Perhaps fifteen of his paintings have survived. Nevertheless, these few works, together with his notebooks, which contain drawings, scientific diagrams, and his thoughts on the nature of painting, compose a contribution to later generations of artists rivalled only by that of his contemporary, Michelangelo.
Leonardo is revered for his technological ingenuity. He conceptualised flying machines, a type of armoured fighting vehicle, concentrated solar power, an adding machine, and the double hull. Relatively few of his designs were constructed or even feasible during his lifetime, as the modern scientific approaches to metallurgy and engineering were only in their infancy during the Renaissance. Some of his smaller inventions, however, such as an automated bobbin winder and a machine for testing the tensile strength of wire, entered the world of manufacturing unheralded. A number of Leonardo's most practical inventions are nowadays displayed as working models at the Museum of Vinci. He made substantial discoveries in anatomy, civil engineering, geology, optics, and hydrodynamics, but he did not publish his findings and they had no direct influence on later science.
Today, Leonardo is widely considered one of the most diversely talented individuals ever to have lived.
“Of the horse I will say nothing because I know the times.”
This relates to a huge equestrian statue that Leonardo had been commissioned to design and create, but which was not cast until over 500 years later, in 1999, when two huge statues based upon his design were finally made. (c.1497)
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XI The Notes on Sculpture
“Movement will cease before we are weary of being useful.”
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), X Studies and Sketches for Pictures and Decorations
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), I Prolegomena and General Introduction to the Book on Painting
“Science is the captain, and practice the soldiers.”
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), IV Perspective of Disappearance
“We are deceived by promises and time disappoints us…”
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
“I give the degrees of things seen by the eye as the musician does of the sounds heard by the ear.”
The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci (1938), XXIX Precepts of the Painter
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XI The Notes on Sculpture
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), II Linear Perspective
“The motive power is the cause of all life.”
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), II Linear Perspective
“Ask counsel of him who rules himself well.”
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
Of the eye
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), I Prolegomena and General Introduction to the Book on Painting
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XI The Notes on Sculpture
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XXI Letters. Personal Records. Dated Notes.
“The part always has a tendency to reunite with its whole in order to escape from its imperfection.”
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), II Linear Perspective
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), IV Perspective of Disappearance
The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci (1938), XLV Prophecies
The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci (1938), I Philosophy
The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci (1938), I Philosophy
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), X Studies and Sketches for Pictures and Decorations
Variant: Ivy is [a type] of longevity.
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XX Humorous Writings
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIV Anatomy, Zoology and Physiology
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), I Prolegomena and General Introduction to the Book on Painting
“Truth was the only daughter of Time.”
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
“As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so life well used brings happy death.”
The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci (1938), I Philosophy
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), I Prolegomena and General Introduction to the Book on Painting
“It is the infinite alone that cannot be attained, for if it could it would become finite.”
Thoughts on Art and Life, by Leonardo da Vinci http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29904, (1906)
